The Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

other’s houses since childhood.
    Well, they weren’t children anymore, and she’d as soon knock as walk in on something she shouldn’t.
    He could have had a woman in here, for all she knew. The man attracted them like sugar water attracted bees. Not that he was sweet, necessarily. Though he could be.
    God, he was pretty. The errant thought popped into her head, and she immediately hated herself for it. But it was hard not to notice, after all.
    All that fine black hair looking just a bit shabby, as he never remembered when it was time for a trim. Eyes of a quiet and dreamy blue—unless he was roused by something, and then, she recalled, they could fire hot and cold in equal measure. He had long, dark lashes that her four sisters would have sold their soul for and a full, firm mouth that was meant, she supposed, for long kisses and soft words.
    Not that she knew of either firsthand. But she’d heard tell.
    His nose was long and just slightly crooked from a line drive she’d hit herself, smartly, when they’d been playing American baseball more than ten years before.
    All in all, he had the face of some fairy-tale prince come to life. Some gallant knight on a quest. Or a slightly tattered angel. Add that to a long, lanky body, wonderfully wide-palmed hands with the fingers of an artist, a voice like whiskey warmed by a turf fire, and he made quite the package.
    Not that she was interested, particularly. It was just that she appreciated things that were made well.
    And what a liar she was, even to herself.
    She’d had a yen for him even before she’d beaned him with that baseball—and she’d been fourteen to his nineteen at the time. And a yen tended to grow into something hotter, something nervier, by the time a woman was twenty-four.
    Not that he ever looked at her like she was a woman.
    Just as well, she assured herself, and shifted her stance. She didn’t have time to hang around mooning over the likes of Shawn Gallagher. Some people had work to do.
    Fixing a thin sneer on her face, she deliberately lowered her toolbox and let it fall with a terrible clatter. That he jumped like a rabbit under the gun pleased her.
    “Christ Jesus!” He scraped his chair around, thumped a hand to his heart as if to get it pumping again. “What’s the matter?”
    “Nothing.” She continued to sneer. “Butterfingers,” she said sweetly and picked up her dented toolbox again. “Give you a start, did I?”
    “You damn near killed me.”
    “Well, I knocked, but you didn’t bother to come to the door.”
    “I didn’t hear you.” He blew out a breath, scooped his hair back, and frowned at her. “Well, here’s the O’Toole come to call. Is something broken, then?”
    “You’ve a mind like a rusty bucket.” She shrugged out of her jacket, tossed it over the back of a chair. “Your oven there hasn’t worked for a week,” she reminded him with a nod toward the stove. “The part I ordered for it just came in. Do you want me to fix it or not?”
    He made a sound of assent and waved his hand toward it.
    “Biscuits?” she said as she walked by the table. “What kind of breakfast is that for a man grown?”
    “They were here.” He smiled at her in a way that made her want to cuddle him. “It’s a bother to cook just for myself most mornings, but if you’re hungry I’ll fix something up for the both of us.”
    “No, I’ve eaten.” She set her toolbox down, opened it, started to rummage through. “You know Ma always fixes more than enough. She’d be happy to have you wander down any morning you like and have a decent meal.”
    “You could send up a flare when she makes her griddle cakes. Will you have some tea in any case? The pot’s still warm.”
    “I wouldn’t mind it.” As she chose her tools, got out the new part, she watched his feet moving around the kitchen. “What were you doing? Writing music?”
    “Fiddling with words for a tune,” he said absently. His eye had caught the flight of a single bird, black and glossy against the dull pewter sky. “Looks bitter out today.”
    “ ’Tis, and damp with it. Winter’s barely started and I’m wishing it over.”
    “Warm your bones a bit.” He crouched down with a thick mug of tea, fixed as he knew she liked it, strong and heavy on the sugar.
    “Thanks.” The heat from the mug seeped into her hands as she cupped them around it.
    He stayed where he was, sipping his own tea. Their knees bumped companionably. “So, what will you do